In case you aren't already aware (which I am certain you are), the US has imposed some travel bans and VISA restrictions on some Caribbean Islands. One of the conditional terms by which a country's citizens can apply for a VISA is that a country must accept refugees.
First, Antigua & Barbuda, and Dominica accepted this, now Saint Kitts & Nevis has joined the fray. Now even if you're not from these islands, there's one thing we should know about our leaders: Monkey see, monkey do.
And we should not only act when something starts affecting us. We need to speak up for our brother and sister islands. We are all the same people, regardless of being separated by waters.
Are they working on behalf of the general public? Is this what we want, and if not, what can we do about it. I don't want to have discussions on whether we agree or disagree with what our governments are doing, but let's discuss actionable steps we can take to support or disarm their decisions.
I think it's important for us to remember that there are more of us, than them.
I look forward to your insights in the comments.
My thoughts are that everybody likes to act altruistic/better-than-thou when it's about other people's countries, until it's their country's turn to accept refugees/immigrants.
True, but not all countries can readily accept immigrants or refugees as others.
A large nation Telling a tiny island they aren’t pulling their fair share is hilarious in my perspective.
It’s not though. Your comment is contradicting. Size is completely irrelevant because you said “fair share.” In other words it’s proportional. Many if not most Caribbean countries love to lecture while they do absolutely nothing.
Because “doing something”, in the grand scale of things hardly puts a dent in the problem. Especially for smaller Caribbean islands.
It’s not only land that’s a problem, but job availability, and infrastructure/housing.
Economically, it makes more sense for smaller Caribbean countries to assist nations which refugees come from(like Haiti) than to try house them.
Because in the end refugees will take up all the resources and the problems happening where they come from will continue. In larger countries, despite illegal immigrants, wealth continues to grow.
But for smaller islands/economies, wealth will most likely stagnate. If they hit their economic ceilings, they can begin to falter and start the issue all over again.
It’s not only a percentage issue, but A scale of economics issue. Some places have lowers ceilings.
This makes quite literally zero sense. “Hardly puts a dent in the problem” is meaningless. It just means “we don’t really have to do anything because we’re small.” You quite literally explained everything happening in DR yet think it’s different in the Bahamas.
The Bahamas and the DR are literally in same boat. About 20% of the Bahamas population is of Haitian background alone. In fact, we are in a more fickle position as people like to use our country as a door to America.
We have one of the highest earning economies in the region and 700 Islands & cays(Extra land).
Yet we still struggle economically & logistically with the burden of illegal migration.
Eastern Caribbean countries, with smaller populations, way less land, less jobs, and a smaller economies/ economic potential don’t have the means to harbour refugees in any sense.
At best they might 10,000+ refugees. At the same time probably tanking their economies and not help or changing much of migration crisis in our region.
Trinidad and ABC islands deal with Venezuelan refugees as well, so the DR isn’t in some position by itself.
It this. No other country on earth takes as many Haitians as the DR both proportionally and by total numbers. Every hospital and school you go to is filled with them. And it’s even worse due to historical issues. Haitians absolutely despise Dominicans and live in eternal victim hood. The other Caribbean islands are “their brothers.” I could care less about Haiti. If it were up to me there wouldn’t be a single one on our side of the island. They’re unworthy of this help and their problems are theirs to solve.
Anyways, your opinion of Haitians isn’t relevant to me or what I’m trying to say.
My main point is that there isn’t economically viable sense for the Lesser Antilles to support mass refugees. It makes more sense to give Haiti development Aid. If you can provide any reason to oppose my ideas, I’m open to it.
If you want to bad mouth Haitians, I’m not participating. What we both can agree is Haiti needs to fix its problems. I think the best way for region to do that is to assist with Haiti’s stability.
Neither is yours lol. There isn’t an economically viable sense for Haitians to be in DR in their current numbers either. You can’t call out “racism” and do absolutely nothing to help though or only say “we can’t manage so you take care of it all.” And no we can’t agree on that. I could care less if Haiti is a failed state for all eternity.
Fair, but there is a difference when you consider that it's the US's own foreign policy which is creating these refugees in the first place. Asking a tiny country with nothing to do with any geopolitical conflicts to take in thousands of asylum seekers when they are already heavily indebted and can barely provide sustenance for their own people is asinine.
It’s not though. Haiti is where it is because of a corrupt culture not because of the US.
I bet by Friday next week that list is longer..smh
Definitely.
We shouldn’t be participating in the U.S.’s unethical refugee scheme, in my opinion. This is just another chapter in the long history of Monroe Doctrine bullshit.
We’ve been running around talking about how little space and resources we have instead of confronting how we are far more dependent on the United States than we should be.
We quick to say the U.S. government isn’t shit. But back home, we're not psuhing strongly enough for regional cooperation, diversified trade, or political alignment beyond what we've gotten for decades now. Then people get vex when our leaders feel “compelled” to make deals like this.
It's comments like this I was looking forward to. Instead, I'm getting bombarded by angry Dominicans (DR).
I 100% agree with your comment.
But are you saying that we shouldn't get vex? Who's supposed to lead the regional agenda? Us or these same leaders?
Yeah, I should have used “surprised” instead of “vex,” because I don’t think people are really angry enough about what’s going on right now. What’s more disturbing is how many people seem comfortable with a “once it not we, everything irie” mentality when it comes to what’s happening, and that, in my opinion, is absolutely tasteless.
If there’s one lesson to take from this entire shit show, it’s that we can not afford to sit on our hands and leave our political leaders as the sole voices for our territories. We have seen, repeatedly, that when decisions are made about us without us, the normal citizens are the ones who pay the price the most.
Our leaders are flawed. The fact that the current head of CARICOM made a decision to specifically refuse Haitian refugees, members of the bloc, is a clear indication of that. The fact that Kamala is willing to bad talk Antigua and Dominica to try and fighten her citizens is a clear indication of that. The fact that the US is now making moves for Cuba and our leaders are silent is a clear indication. of that.
It is pretty obvious this is the transaction based Trump admin foreign policy at play. The MO for Antigua and Barbuda and Dominica is to restore US visa access for their citizens, while St Kitts and Nevis are trying to keep off the CBI naughty list. The threat of not being able to visit the US for tourism, education, and seeing friends and family whether casually or for big ticket life events like weddings, illnesses, deaths, births, etc. is top of mind for the almost the whole population and the respective administrations' political lives in the near term will be tied to this.
Honestly it doesn't make a lick of sense for the US to spend political capital this way based on any current situation or need for the US. The capacity of these countries to take in people is limited and even 10 737s per year full of people staying indefinitely in each country would be a strain on housing stock, infrastructure, education, etc. The flip side is that this can be an economic growth boon. The cultural and demographic shifts will inevitably end up being a problem for the local populations, also causing problems for the incumbent administrations.
Furthermore, there are like 2 million refugee claimants in the US. Even if you sign up 10 more Caribbean islands to similar deals, the US can't use this to significantly change numbers on their end on any long term basis.
So this feels like one of a few things:
The decision makers in the US administration on this are incompetent and are just trying to get wins and treat other countries as NPCs.
This is meant as part of appeasing the US voter base - sending refugees to exotic holiday destinations reads as humane to the left, it will read as Trump making refugees not America's problem on the right, and US citizens will quip online that they'd like to be refugees and spend a few years in paradise.
There is some future state problem or access this is a setup for as a bargaining chip to influence the Caribbean countries.
EDIT: I don't actually expect many refugees to make it any of these countries beyond some token amount.
EDIT2: Now reading on Jan 12th that the proposal from Antigua is for between 10 and 12 refugees per year.
CARICOM criticized DR for not accepting a massive unrestricted flow of millions of refugees. A few member countries will have to accept a few refugees on their own agreed terms so now we should all be concerned.
CARICOM criticised DR for stripping millions of Haitian descendants born in DR of their citizenship retroactively. Big difference.
Millions? When the hell did millions of Haitians get citizenship in DR?
This is an incident that happened in 2013, right? If so, weren't these criticisms for not accepting Haitian citizens? You guys literally share an island.
I'm not clear on the details of what kind of refugees the US wants the Caribbean to accept, but if its our own Caribbean nationals, I say we accept them, and reintegrate them into society.
The 2013 incident. Many countries share land borders that does not mean they allow uncontrolled migration.
In this new deal CARICOM refugees excluding Haitians will be among those received, which one can only assume was negotiated on behalf of the member countries.
The Caribbean community condemns immigration enforcement of these nationals abroad but unwilling to accept a small amount into their country.
It's usually advised for host countries that are going to accept refugees, to not accept refugees of countries they border with. For example , if Chile were to accept Haitians as refugees , they have better control on the # they are willing to accept .
Refugees cannot be deported , so if DR were to accept Haitian refugees ..there would be a stampede at the border and harder to control the inflow.
Stampede at the border
If it's my fellow Caribbean they can hang anyone else can go elsewhere
I’m not mad at it 😂
Agreed
I know many people that would disagree with what I’m about to say, but it has to be said. I think this conversation often skips over the fact that this is not a simple moral question, it’s a practical one. Small island states have real constraints. Population size, land availability, housing, jobs, healthcare, water, and infrastructure are not abstract concerns. For countries like ours, those factors are not only valid, they should be central to any decision about accepting refugees.
At the same time, we also need to be honest about something uncomfortable. Too often in the Caribbean, concerns about resources get mixed with or replaced by outright hostility toward people who are not “from here.” That rhetoric exists, and it is ugly. In Barbados, for example, it it is said “the only good Guyanese is a dead Guyanese,” and that should give us immediate pause.
We should be able to hold both truths at once. It is reasonable to acknowledge our limits, and it is also necessary to reject dehumanizing language and attitudes. Most people seeking refuge want safety, stability, and the chance to contribute, not to drain or destabilize the societies they enter.
If we are going to have this discussion seriously, it has to be based on capacity and planning, not fear or xenophobia. Fairness, realism, and basic humanity should not be mutually exclusive. I don’t expect many to flee to the Caribbean, but it is disheartening to already hear horrible things about people that have done nothing wrong.
Yes, this discussion is supposed to be based on capacity and planning. I noticed some comments have taken it in the other direction, unfortunately.
We have more refugees than the rest of Caribbean combined, we pass, we're good.
What does this comment mean?
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Everything has limits, DR just can't be accepting unlimited amounts of Haitians, that's unreasonable. There's other countries that would turn away as little as 50 Haitians and that's documented. DR can't be captain-save-a-ho to everybody wanting to cross their border.
Most countries that border humanitarian disasters are anti-immmigration. I wish the leaders foresight, cleverness, and empathy.
You’re so corny for that. We have millions of Haitians in our country but we hate them? Try again loser
Question how many Haitian do DR have? I heard 3 million, I heard 6 millions, and I heard half the population is Haitian. I heard those numbers all from Dominican online
Between 500k to 2 million. At least 1 million is the commonly accepted estimate.
We don’t know definitively. If you include citizens with majority Haitian ancestry into the total it could be close to half the population.
1.5 million or less makes sense
Why count Dominican that have some Haitian ancestry? If a half Dominican and half Haitian is born in Dominican. That kid is Dominican. Point blank.
Is that the reason why I hear Dominican nationalists online saying all dark skin Dominicans are Haitian? And that real Dominicans are white?
See how they downvote your comment? But then the mods get mad if I say it outright.
This sub is Dominican owned.
They can use dog whistle about Haitian all they want and nothing will happen to them.
But if I defend Haitian I get a warning and threat to get banned.
That’s why Haitian don’t post on here
If they only knew they will never in a million years be invited to the “club,” they’d be a lot happier. Even the whitest Dominican is still black behind the ears.
It’s getting downvoted because the people can use google and see that everything he is saying is straight up bullshit.
They would be a dual national with mixed Haitian and Dominican ethnicity. The reason Haitian ancestry is relevant is because it demonstrates the scale in outcome of past migration policy.
As for any country drastically altering the ethnic makeup results in tension within the origin population. Look at Europe, granting millions of foreigners and their descendants nationality who have had trouble with integration. I don't even have to mention Canada.
Whether you see it as good or bad it's hardly unique to DR and naïve to claim this wouldn't cause a significant reaction in any country. If Haiti was completely replaced with foreigners and their descendants, it wouldn't be Haiti anymore.
All dark skin Dominicans aren't necessarily Haitian but many of them are. I haven't seen anyone say real Dominicans are white. The Dominican founding population is a mixture of European, Taino and African ancestry.
That’s not how dual nationality work.
The kid is born in DR and only holds a Dominican nationality. So the kid is Dominican.
The thing you said about Europe is irrelevant because Dominicans had Haitian blood from a long time ago.
lol the borders between the two countries is very much very recent.
Hell your famous president Trujillo had a Haitian grandmother.
My question is at what year you going want to start tracking Haitian blood? Is it from the beginning? If so than yea Haitians are the majority in DR.
One drop of Haitian blood makes you Haitian?
Dominican average 45 African and 6 Taino but yet claim European and Taino and a lil African.
Have a good day my guy
Neither DR nor Haiti has birthright citizenship.
Nationality is derived from your parents per both constitutions. So that that individual is a dual national regardless of whether they registered their birth to the Haitian authorities.
Most Haitian ancestry is recent starting from a significant influx late 19th/ early 20th century to work the sugar industry.
Within this time period it can reasonably be tracked up from 3/4 generations where individuals have descended entirely from Haitian born great grandparents, then they are ethnically Haitian.
We know Trujillo is part Haitian. There are many such cases.
Enjoy your night likewise.
There’s just over 11 million people in the DR, including legal and illegal Haitians as well as those with majority Haitian descent, I’d say about 30-35% of the country is Haitian. Theres A LOT of them there to the point we cannot sustain any more immigration. Last year alone 40%of the nations births in the DR were from Haitian women. Way over capacity.
So why is your numbers correct? Everyday online I hear Dominicans pulling randoms numbers out of nowhere. Last month I heard 4 million. Now this week I am hearing 7 million Haitian in DR.
I also heard Dominican nationalist online saying all dark skin Dominican in DR are just Haitian.
I also heard Haitian make the majority in DR.
All those numbers can’t be right at the same time.
Yall got to stick with 1 story
You’re being willfully ignorant. The only people denying the massive immigration of Haitians to DR are people like you.
Huh? I am asking you which one? Is it 4 million Haitian, 7 million or half the population is Haitian?
I listen to a lot of Dominican nationalist they say DR is majority Haitian.
So I guess it’s not a problem. If you are happy than I am happy.
Nobody is happy about Haitians being there. They just have to deal with it because it’s the humane thing to do. We aren’t going to enslave or attempt to genocide them like they did to us. We want them to go back to their country but there isn’t a functional country for them to go back to.
Hard to keep track of the number of Haitians since more are entering illegally without any type of documentation/identification . We just know there must be a big population since there’s multiple enclaves already formed in different spots of the country . It does feel like there’s millions in the country .
or maybe people dislike immigrants , as we can see by the comments of the other thread about this topic.
The government of some countries are particularly exclusionary (Japan, Greece, Israel, your dear country for immigrants from a certain country only) while other governments are exceptionally inclusive (Norway, Ireland, Canada). I think it’s a perceived scarcity ideology.
There is zero tolerance for discrimination and generalization on this subreddit.
100% against.
Instead of bullying small countries that have nothing to do with this refugee crisis, why not tackle the countries that won't accept their own citizens back?
More importantly, most of the Eastern Caribbean does not have the land, resources or infrastructure to assume large numbers of refugees. These people, many of whom are criminals, are going to wreak havoc on our countries.
You wouldn't be considered a refugee if you could easily go back to your country. What marks
someone as a refugee , is if their life/health is threatened in their home country.
Most people who are applying for refugee status aren't refugees though, and their asylum claims are denied. There is a huge incentive to claim asylum in that it guarantees certain protections that simply being undocumented doesn't offer.
https://preview.redd.it/ujntpwaqslcg1.jpeg?width=1171&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7f3690a830473e92b83f834cac64da498531be25
The CARICOM countries are hypocritical.
I think we're forgetting that the small island countries are TINY.
Haiti has a population of 12,000,000. St. Kitts has a population of 35,000 - that's the amount of people in a single neighbourhood in Port-au-Prince. It would be ridiculous to expect them to absorb a significant amount of refugees. In terms of land size, Haiti is about 27,750 km² while St. Kitts and Nevis (combined) is just 261 km². A country like St. Kitts is so so so small in land size that you could fit 106 St. Kitts and Nevis's into Haiti.
How many Haitian “refugees” can you guys take?
There are already a lot of Haitian migrants living in the Eastern Caribbean and in the Bahamas. DR just has more because there is a land border with Haiti.
Moreover, you can't compare a country like DR...which is twice the land mass of Haiti and has 11 million people...to a country like St Kitts or Dominica which have populations comparable to some towns in DR or Haiti. Santiago alone has more people than St Kitts, Nevis, Grenada, Antigua, Dominica and St Lucia combined.
Why do you use “refugees” like that?
Like what?
Why did you put quotation marks “” around refugees?
Because real refugees do not go on vacation to their countries of origin and then return to the country that hosts them as “refugees”.
In my experience Venezuelan refugees have been an excellent positive for Trinbago. If we get fewer, I will miss them. Also, I think the economic argument for more open borders is generally strong for the vast majority of countries.
Data unfortunately does not support liberal democracies accepting middle eastern refugees, to an extent that is a massive exception in most analysis.
It's a mixed bag.
I'm against it. Trinidad is in no position to accept refugees. If we ever get to that point sure, but it needs to be a very limited amount of people per year to not overwhelm the economy.
Up until last year, some 17% of Aruba's population were undocumented refugees/migrants. Almost all of them came in the last 15 years. At one point, most came by plane and never left, then after came the wave of them crossing by boats (yola). Not only Venezuelans, though they make up the majority, but also Colombians, Ecuadorians and Dominicans (D.R). There was even a wave of people coming by cruise ship and never leaving.
Nearing the end of last year, the government gave a 1 year permit, with possibility of extension if they find an employer, to all those that entered legally before the date it was announced. They got about 6000-7000 to sign up within a couple months.
Curacao has similar numbers, at about 15% of population.
Aruba's population density is like 690/km2 now and 35% of the island is part of the national park or not able to be developed for other reasons. All of this to say, it wouldn't kill anyone to accept refugees (from the region) if we were able to do so under such conditions.
DoMiNiCaNs ArE RaCiSt
Belize is also doing this, with literally zero capacity to take care of said refugees. It'll honestly be horrible for them I can't imagine. Absolute shame that we're giving in to the Orange Man's demands but I guess we're just America's backyard after all :(
Uh...these "immigrants" are from the Caribbean back yard, no?
Belize has alot of its own resources no? Why are they listening to America?
The ones who are sent to Dominica will almost certainly try to cross to Guadeloupe or Martinique, most likely through illicit means
Why do you say this?
For one thing, Guadeloupe and Martinique are departments of France
Accepting? Or between a rock and a hard place and blackmailed into saying yes?
Yo... let's get absolutely real. After the operation and exercise of force we saw on our Caribbean waters recently What position are we really in, to tell THEM no?
Every commentator online who is talking about "resisting" is just a paper tiger. The truth is, we are between a rock and a hard place.
People keep talking about standing up to a bully nation. But here is a hard question... are we prepared to "stand up to a bully" against the backdrop of severe economic restrictions? We only have to look to the largest island in our waters to see what that looks like... and it's not easy to do. If we think things hard now, we have NO IDEA how much harder they would get if certain measures were to be applied onto our islands.
If the country has the ability to do so, then okay. But most of our little islands do NOT have the resources. We’re already limited with our own issues, imagine having to provide for refugees?
We should be accepting anyway, but not on Washington's terms
Can you elaborate?
Every state that isn't in abject failure should fulfill its obligations under international law. This includes processing claims for asylum and accepting refugees as per the 1951 Refugee Convention.
This means we should not simply take on who the USA refuses. Rather than genuine "management" of "overflow" which implies bidirectional movement and collaboration, it lets the US government off the hook.
Granted, this Trump administration is not the first to make arrangements like this. The era-defining example for me is Australia's deals with Nauru and Papua New Guinea.